Dr. Who

Fictional Adventurer

Born: 1963

Birthplace: Television

Best known as: Time-travelling hero of the long-running U.K. television series Dr. Who

Dr. Who began as a children's television show in the United Kingdom in 1963. The Doctor and his companions travelled throughout the cosmos and time, battling bad guys like the Daleks, the Cybermen or the Master. Over the years the Doctor was played by a variety of actors, and his character and adventures changed from thoughtful to whimsical accordingly. The show was exported and earned a fervent international following that has kept the series alive to this day, either on video or in book form. The original series ran until 1989, but was followed by various TV projects in the 1990s and relaunched in 2005. The actors who played the Doctor are: William Hartnell (1963-66); Patrick Troughton (1966-69); Jon Pertwee (1970-74); Tom Baker (1974-81); Peter Davison (1982-84); Colin Baker (1984-86); Sylvester McCoy (1987-96); Paul McGann (1996); Christopher Eccleston (2005); David Tennant (2005-10); and Matt Smith (2010).

Extra credit: According to the fan site Outpost Gallifrey, the Doctor travels in a "dimensionally transcendental time machine (i.e. bigger on the inside than on the outside), the camouflage system of which became stuck in the shape of a London police public call box." The time machine is also called TARDIS, an acronym for "Time and Relative Dimensions in Space."